Vogue Kids makes a deal and pays BRL 8.3 million in a campaign against child labor

The company Edições Globo Condé Nast closed on Tuesday (3) an agreement with the Public Ministry of Labor to produce and publicize a campaign against child labor estimated at R$ 8.3 million.

The agreement was proposed and approved by Minister Ives Gandra, of the TST (Superior Labor Court), rapporteur of the public civil action filed by the MPT in 2014, after Vogue Kids published a photo essay with girls aged 7 to 10 years old, considered sensual.

The labor prosecutor found that the magazine used artistic child labor without judicial authorization and exposed the children, portrayed “in sensualized, eroticized positions, even with sexual appeal or connotation.”

Vogue Kids circulated inside the September issue of Vogue that year. The court even ordered the publication of the publication. Editora Globo (which holds a 70% stake in Condé Nast’s operations in Brazil) said it would not respond to the report because it has no ties to Vogue.

Sought on Wednesday (4), Vogue did not respond until the publication of this text. During the process, the publication argued that the exposure of the children’s image had been authorized and consented to by parents and guardians and argued that there was no working relationship, which would waive the request for judicial authorization.

Sexualization and child labor

In the first and second instances of the Labor Court in São Paulo, Edições Globo Condé Nast was ordered to pay moral damages: the content of the images was considered “extremely sexualized” and with excessive emphasis on the body.

“The photo shoot was carried out in a single weekend under the direction of a specialized team of journalists and other professionals,” said the magazine’s defense in the lawsuit.

The three girls photographed did not receive, through their families, any salary for their work. They lived in São Paulo and traveled to Ilha Grande, in Rio de Janeiro, where the photo shoots started on a Saturday morning and ended in the early afternoon of a Sunday.

The publication argued that there was no work relationship, but the Labor Court considered that the children stayed in a place chosen by the publication and at its disposal, acting under professional guidance.

“This cannot fail to be considered work, whether paid or not”, says the ruling of the TRT-2 (Regional Labor Court of the 2nd Region).

For the court, the set of advantages (travel, food, accommodation and exposure in a magazine with national circulation) offered by the magazine was enough to convince the parents.

Fund will fund campaign against child labor

The initial request foresaw the payment of R$ 5.6 million (in updated values) as collective moral damage, which would be reverted to Graacc (Support Group for Adolescents and Children with Cancer). The agreement closed this week replaces the payment for the MPT campaign aimed at combating child labor.

The first actions should start in June this year and will have the support of the newspaper O Globo and the publications Vogue Brasil, Casa Vogue, Glamor and QG.

The campaign will run until May 2023 and will be called Infância Plena. In the month of launch, at least three lives will be held on Vogue’s YouTube channel — the content will be replicated on channels of other titles.

Publications in the print editions of the magazines, opinion articles in the O Globo newspaper and publicity on social networks are also planned.

The campaign’s actions will address the role of the media, child labor and digital influence, racism, work in dumps and productive chairs, child sexual exploitation and the design of solutions.